August 13th 2003 "Regrets, I've had a few, but then again too few to mention" sang Sid Vicious, but I am pretty sure he never went into a barbers salon in Wyoming to ask for a "Mullet"! 'When in Rome do as the Romans do' was a saying never invented to apply to hair styles, but some people just like to take it that little bit too far and spoil the fun for everyone . . .
The high desert of Wyoming was very flat; on our route out of Kemmerer toward the continental divide the roads were long and straight, it was often more than 40 miles between settlements. Along this route we stopped at a shop 'famed' in the local vicinity for it's ice-cream, with a catchment area of a hundred miles or more mainly populated by small thorny bushes it's a pleasant thing to have a reputation for - We certainly enjoyed it anyway! In the 'town' A local bunch of itinerant welders gave us some surprisingly accurate information about the road on to Casper which we were unkeen to believe. We are always very cautious of the directions we receive from people along the road, the problem is that nearly everyone in America travels everywhere by car, estimates for distances usually come in terms of hours drive and hills are never mentioned. The welders turned out to be right and our optimistic hopes of it being all down hill after the divide were soon shattered!
We did'nt see much rain in the deserts, When it did arrive it was during electrical storms, we have been through a few now which is always very refreshing, especially during the heat of the day! No lightening-strike-counts to add to the index page yet but we have come bloody close! The other showers we get are from sprinklers. These vile creations of modern engineering are liable to spring on you (out of hidden holes in the ground!) at any time, especially when you go camping in town parks; beware the green grass!
The down hill cruise to Casper in Wyoming never materialised but we got there after a couple of days and one night spent in a steel tube on a roadside construction site! The town will be remembered for the appalling road surfaces, big hills and the night we spent drinking with a group of motor bikers on their way to the 2003 Sturgess bike rally. The life had really been sucked out of the center of the town by the gigantic mall that now overlooks it, that place was pretty soulless and I had to go somewhere far cooler to get my hair cut!
More misinformation. Never believe anyone that tells you that Nebraska and Iowa are flat, they are lying especially hard if they add that the strong prevailing wind will be behind you all the way on your journey east! We have been cycling across rolling hills since we lost our Rocky's altitude and have had a headwind all the way!
Since exiting Wyoming the scenery slowly changed, more trees started to appear around houses and creeks, next came grasslands and eventually woodlands on the hills and by the roadside. It's a good job neither of us are Buddhists, the number of Grasshoppers that we left squashed or maimed on the road would certainly see us coming back as something pretty insignificant!
So far on the prairies we have seen numerous windmills being used to pump water out of the ground but strangly we have only seen one wind turbine. The wind is very variable in it's direction and unfortunately for us has been mostly out of the N.E. of late. One thing that has had little change in direction since we landed on the west coast is the culture. The shops and restaurants still sell the same goods and food, people are still listening to the same music (country and hard rock mainly), the grid layout of the towns and cities is still the same and ostensibly people have remained very friendly. One question that people ask us very often is "Are you enjoying your time in the U.S.?" or the rhetorical version "We hope you are enjoying your time in the U.S." The former question is often asked of us by the more cosmopolitan and informed Americans who seem concerned for their countries international popularity. Things that are mentioned are the recent "Preemptive" war against Iraq, continuing neglect of world environmental issues and the constant fear of terrorist attacks. The insecurity of everyone else is evident in the large number of flags, bumper stickers and other banners we see proclaiming: United we Stand, We support our troops, Proud to be an American or God bless America. But whoever asks the question we always answer "Yes, the people have been very kind to us". We endear ourselves to the locals in a couple of major areas; we are young cyclists and we are British. unfortunately I don't think that some other European nationalities would receive such a warm reception from everyone over here at the moment.
Our welcome to the Midwest started in the tiny village of Kilgore, where we had our first introduction to Native American culture. Unfortunately the introduction of Alcohol to the Indians society has taken a drastic and negative effect, we were told that the poor ones own nothing and drink all day while the rich ones own casinos (Due to gambling restrictions not being valid on Indian reservations) and drink all night too. I know very little about how things got this way but would be very interested in reading Bury my heart at wounded knee Which details the arrival of the European colonialists. . . Anyway, we stopped for our lunch break at P&K's quick stop, the town bar and shop where a lot of the Indians get their drink. After a few beers ourselves we got talking to Phil the owner and he ended up very kindly asking us if we would like to camp in his garden down the road in Valentine. 20 slow miles, a state border and a time zone later we arrived in the town. Phil and his wife Kim made us very welcome and we ended up carrying on the beer drinking session in their kitchen. Meanwhile their 14-year-old son took my bike for a rag around town and came back with it just before midnight in various broken pieces! Fortunately Phil was used to build f16 fighter jets so fixing my bike was a mere synch!
Since Valentine we have not had to spend any nights outside of city limits, we are now approaching the more populated areas of the east U.S. and continue to use the city parks as our free camp grounds. The town of Bassette in central Nebraska took our arrival pretty seriously, after we had finished watching a young Cowgirl do her lasso training in the town stadium her Mum came over to interview and photograph us for the local paper, what a scoop that was!
The first major town we got to was Sioux City, quite a confusing place as it lies across three state borders! (South Dakota, Nebraska and Iowa). We weren’t too impressed with the town for our choice of a rest day; once again a large out-of-town-mall had got there before us to swipe all the facilities from the center! We reconciled ourselves with the fact that being a rest day we shouldn’t be rushing around doing things anyway. All that changed very soon. Coming back from our evening meal that night Rob was distracted by a "Cheap beer" sign by the side of the road. I didn’t see him stop and cycled right into the back of him - buckling his wheel irreparably!!! The following day our plight was spotted by a Susan and Tom who are keen cyclists them selves they wanted to be sure we weren’t left bikeless. they drove us out to the mall to buy a new wheel rim and even treated us to a restaurant meal while we were there! One of the topics that came up while we were eating was Ragbrai this is a weeklong cycling event that crosses the state, with more than 10,000 riders anually it is an event we were sorry to miss! That afternoon I helped Rob to rebuild his wheel and we were back on the road the next day with only a quick trip to the bike shop to delay our progress.
Our route out of Sioux city was a very pleasant one, the farmlands continued all around us and treated us to an interesting remnant of American history as we saw hemp plants line the road! The effective prohibition of hemp production that occurred in the U.S.in 1937 by the introduction of 'the marihuana tax act' and the continued international policy to ignore hemp as a crop have had serious environmental repercussions. Unfortunately it is an issue that environmental campaigners all too often shy away from for the fear of being labeled as "pot smoking hippies". I am no hippy and I don't care if you think I smoke pot or not (I do as a matter of fact), but if you want to see the many uses of this versatile farm crop you might want to check this site out: torontohemp.com
Our first night in Iowa was spent in a bed! Pat and Dan of sister and brother-in-law of our Sioux city saviors got a raw deal when they were asked to host us for the night, a job they did with few complaints and a lot of hospitality, very nice pool table by the way!
The following night after swimming in the Jefferson town pool we were put up in a motel by some very good Samaritans, Todd and Cindy two strongly evangelical Christians were very interested in out trip, the least I can do in return is a link to their site www.partsbook.biz. Thanks a lot you two.
Now we are at this moment 4 days cycle ride outside of Chicago, it's going to take us a little longer to get there though as we have a parachute jump booked in for this Monday! Geronimo!!! Jim over and out.